


Defiling Kitchen Appliances and Other Ways to Meet Your Soulmate(s)

by McSpot



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, M/M, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-22
Updated: 2017-12-22
Packaged: 2019-02-18 08:05:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,435
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13095906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/McSpot/pseuds/McSpot
Summary: James realized at a young age that there were two types of people in the world.  There were those who so didn’t give a shit about finding out who their soulmate was that their first words to them wereHey, man,and then there were those overachievers who made sure that nobody could ever miss their introduction by saying things like,Hold on, you aren’t seriously going to try to put that in a toaster, are you?Though, perhaps the fact that somebody would one day be saying those words to him said more about him than it did about his soulmate.





	Defiling Kitchen Appliances and Other Ways to Meet Your Soulmate(s)

**Author's Note:**

> justanotherfacet was prompting me to write some Nealer/Dicky/Paulie OT3 fic for my werewolf AU, and while I'm still trying to work that out, inspiration came to me to write this instead.
> 
> Unedited because since when do I edit anything?

James realized at a young age that there were two types of people in the world. There were those who so didn't give a shit about finding out who their soulmate was that their first words to them were  _Hey, man,_  and then there were those overachievers who made sure that nobody could ever miss their introduction by saying things like,  _Hold on, you aren't seriously going to try to put that in a toaster, are you?_

Though, perhaps the fact that somebody would one day be saying those words to him said more about him than it did about his soulmate.

Well, one of them, anyway.

It wasn't uncommon for people to have more than one soulmate – hell, there was that one group that made the news that had like, eight soulmates, and James didn't even want to imagine what their sleeping arrangements looked like. Multiple soulmates were still unusual enough though to be a mildly impressive thing to show off on the playground as a kid, and James had never been someone you could describe as shy. As a kid he'd loved showing off his soul marks, one short set of words in a slanting scrawl over the inside of his left ankle and another in neat, precise letters wrapping around the left side of his ribs.

It had felt cool,  _special_ , right up until Mark Conlon in third grade had scoffed and said that you only had more than one name because you were too whiny for one person to deal with.

Punching him in the face had felt pretty cool, actually, though the trip to the principal's office and waiting for his mom to come pick him up was something he could have done without.

His mom hadn't yelled at him though like he'd expected. She'd put her hands on her hips, watching him slouch down in his chair in the front office, and sighed.

"You know that's not how we deal with bullies," she said.

"That's how Spiderman deals with bullies," James countered. Spiderman was the ultimate trump card. Nobody could say something bad about Spiderman.

His mom had given him a long-suffering look that would become her close companion over the years and crouched down in front of him, taking his hands in hers.

"We'll talk about that later," she said quietly. "What I want to make sure you know now is that that boy is wrong about having more than one soulmate. It doesn't mean that you're needy or whiny. It just means that you have so much love inside you that you have enough for two people."

James squinted at her.

"Does that mean that I don't have as much love as Jordie on my hockey team, because he has  _three_  sets of soulmate words-"

"No, no." His mom squeezed his hands, a hint of a smile in her voice. "The number of soulmates you have doesn't make you better or worse than anyone. It just means that you're different. Some people are meant to share their love with one really special person-"

"Like you and Dad?"

She'd smiled for real then and nodded.

"Yes, like me and Dad. And then sometimes people share their love with more than one person, each of them special in their own way. Nobody is right or wrong."

"Except Mark Conlon."

His mom closed her eyes, took a deep breath and sighed.

That was, over the years, how a lot of people reacted to meeting James. He could never quite decide if it bothered him or not.

Most people were either blessed or cursed by their soulmate words. Some people had truly unique first sentences, things like,  _Oh my God, I swear the turtle is totally tame, I promise_  and  _I'm sorry, but I think you're holding my blender_. James had a cousin with the words,  _When I imagined this happening, I thought I'd be wearing pants,_ wrapped around her hand, which always made for a good conversation starter.

Unique phrases were a godsend, because they made it so much easier to identify if you'd actually met your soulmate or not. You had to feel bad for those millions of people whose bodies were marked by  _Hello_  and  _Hi_  and  _Excuse me_ and  _Sorry._ The best that they could hope was that their soulmate would respond with something truly inspired, or there was a real chance that they could bump into each other on the street, apologize, and never meet again.

People wrote miserable novels about that sort of scenario. They usually won awards.

James had one of each. On the one hand, he knew that he would one day apparently attempt to defile a toaster, which seemed like something he absolutely couldn't miss or overlook.

On the other, the amount of times that he heard "hey, man" playing hockey was probably right up there with the number of times most people heard a normal "hello," meaning he was going to have a hell of a time finding that soulmate.

When he was young, he used to try to say something unique in response every time, just to make sure that if they were his soulmate they absolutely couldn't miss him.

But that got old pretty quick when all he got for his efforts were blank stares and awkward silences. It was honestly pretty demoralizing, to build himself up with excitement every time he heard his words just to be let down again.

James heard the words "hey, man" no less than fifteen times at his first Dallas Stars prospect camp alone, each while meeting a new person, none of whom were impressed by his overly detailed and personalized greetings ("wow, that green jersey really brings out your eyes, congratulations on your face").

After about the tenth one, he just gave up and switched to a nonsensical, "Hey, what's up?" which seemed to be met with much more positivity.

~~~

By the time James was assigned to the Iowa Stars three years later he'd pretty much resigned himself to never meeting that soulmate except through sheer, dumb luck. He was ready to give up making a fool of himself.

He wasn't there to look for his soulmate anyway. He was there to play hockey, to impress people enough that they'd call him up to the NHL, and so that's what he would do.

(He consoled himself that Toaster Man might have better luck in locating their other soulmate. At least if he missed his soulmate the first time around, Toaster Man might find them.)

All the same, the first day of training camp for the Stars was a special kind of hell, because it seemed like the standard greeting for any and all Stars players was, "hey, man." Literally five guys in a row who James had never even heard of before shook his hand, pulled him into that ubiquitous one-armed back-slapping hug, all while saying, "Hey, man," like they were friends catching up after a summer apart instead of strangers meeting for the first time.

After the first one made James's heart give a weak, traitorous flutter of hope, he quickly tamped it down, slapped on his best guileless media smile, and said, "Hey, how's it going?"

Something about those introductions was especially excruciating, because James couldn't get his pulse to settle, couldn't get that jittery feeling out of his palms and feet, like an adrenaline rush without a source. He felt like he was gearing up for something, something big, but he had no clue what it was.

Maybe it was just camp, he told himself. After all, Iowa was only one step away from Dallas.

Camp went really well. The season itself, maybe not so much for the team, but James himself put up a pretty good showing, got his name out there. The word trickling down from the front office was that he might not be back in Iowa next year, that he might just go straight to Dallas and stay there.

He met some interesting people that year too.

Rich Clune was...an experience. On paper he sounded like an asshole, and maybe that's because he kind of  _was_  an asshole, but he was also kind of fantastic. You had to meet him to see the appeal.

He was also an absolute mess. James wasn't the most observant guy around, but even he could pick up on that. At any given time he seemed like he'd either been drinking or was just about to, and James didn't need the whispers around the locker room to guess that he was into a lot harder stuff than that.

But he was nice to James, nicer than he had to be and nicer than he ever was to anyone else. He took James under his wing, like they weren't the same age and James didn't have four inches on him, like Rich's one game with Iowa last season made him some kind of old veteran showing the new rookie the ropes. He looked out for him, too, kept the other guys from messing with him too much – the time he stopped someone from messing with James's hair spray, James couldn't help staring at him like he was the second coming.

Rich had more problems than he had teeth, but he was always really good to James, and for that, James would always have his back.

Rich wasn't with the Stars the whole season – he got sent down to the Steelheads part of the time, and that sucked, not having his friend around. Rich didn't act like it really concerned him, which in retrospect James realized should have been concerning in and of itself.

But they were young, and he was trying to make a name for himself in his first year of professional hockey, and he didn't want to step on anyone's toes or rock the boat by looking to someone for help. And so he kept his mouth shut about Rich's nosebleeds, and how he was pretty sure Rich was drinking before breakfast when they shared a room on the road, and he focused on his hockey.

If and when Rich wanted his help, he would ask.

(Rich also wore bandages on his right bicep and taped scandalously low on his left hip, but James could guess what those were and they were  _really_  none of his business, no matter how much he burned to ask.)

In the mean time, the Iowa Stars were a miserable team, but the Dallas Stars liked what they saw.

The next season James made his NHL debut, and Rich was playing for the Manchester Monarchs, and they pretty much lost touch after that.

He wouldn't see Rich Clune again for another six years.

By the time James was traded to Pittsburgh at the deadline during his third year with Dallas, he was 23 and liked to think of himself as a somewhat functional adult. After all, he'd packed up his necessities on his own, made it onto his flight from Dallas to Pittsburgh without needing to ask an employee for assistance, and he'd had no problems getting from his hotel to the arena in time to meet with management the next morning.

Of course, he'd had Nisky there with him pretty much the entire way, laughing as James woke up late and had to rush through his normal routine with his hair less-than-perfect and breakfast that was more of a really sad apple from the hotel's continental breakfast, but  _regardless_ , James was on time for his meeting and an  _adult_.

And because he was a functional adult, after their meetings and the grand tour of the arena and the promise that everyone else should be filtering in pretty soon for practice, James decided to try to make himself something to eat in the player's lounge.

There were two fridges, both of which were really well-stocked, so it wasn't hard to find some eggs and bacon and a loaf of bread.

Frying the eggs was...well, they were certainly cooked in the end. Very thoroughly. There would be no salmonella here.

The bacon went about the same, but that was because one time James had thought his bacon was cooked and it had turned out that it was still soft not because it was perfectly tender but because it wasn't cooked all the way through, and after that he'd decided he'd rather have it singed than not be sure it was done and repeat that experience.

The toast he could make. He was proud to say that he was a champ at making toast.

But when he tried to assemble everything into a sandwich the way his mom would, it all just kind of looked...sad. And it fell apart at the first bite. His mom had some sort of press at home, one she used for cooked sandwiches, and everything that went through it always stuck together really well and came out cooked to perfection.

They didn't have anything like that here, but the toaster had extra-wide slots, so maybe if he just really quickly-

"Hold on, you aren't seriously going to try to put that in a toaster, are you?"

James nearly spilled the contents of his sandwich all over the toaster. As it was, a piece of charred egg dropped guiltily into one of the slots.

He turned slowly to look over his shoulder.

Paul Martin was staring at him, one ginger eyebrow raised, his entire expression so thoroughly unimpressed that James felt a flush crawling up his neck and curling around his ears, which he happened to know were sticking out a lot today because he hadn't been able to fix his hair properly to cover them better.

Paul Martin was starting to look more and more like he thought there was something seriously wrong with James, and maybe there was, but Paul Martin had also just said the words that were written in tidy, even black letters over James's ribs, and that meant that Paul Martin was-

"Toaster Man," James breathed.

He wouldn't have blamed Paul if he'd looked at him like he was crazy, because even James would admit that it was kind of a strange way to refer to your soulmate. But Paul didn't laugh, or roll his eyes, or ask what the hell he was talking about.

Instead, Paul's face somehow got impossibly paler, his mouth hung open almost comically, and he looked like his brain had shut itself off and needed a few seconds to reboot.

When he finally composed himself, it was to close his eyes, shake his head and huff, "Do you know how many toasters people have given me as gag gifts over the year thanks to you?"

"My siblings bought me  _Toasters for Dummies_ ," James said breathlessly, his sandwich dropping, forgotten, onto his plate as he turned to face Paul fully. "They said I should try not to scandalize you too much, with whatever awful thing I was going to do."

"But you still were about to try putting some sort of sandwich in a  _toaster_."

Paul's words were disparaging, but his eyes were bright and he was stepping closer like he didn't even realize he was doing it, like he couldn't help himself.

"They don't have a panini press here," James said, because it made sense in his head.

"Then you press it with a spatula in a frying pan."

Paul was really cute when his eyebrows scrunched together like that, with those little lines between them. James kind of wanted to kiss him there, and also on his lips, and-

"Oh. I mean, I guess that would have worked..."

He wasn't even sure what he was saying anymore, because Paul was right up in his space now, giving off warmth even though his nose still looked a little red from coming in out of the cold.

James licked his lips, his gaze flicking helplessly between Paul's eyes and his mouth.

Paul began to lean in, closing the distance between them, and then-

"Can I see it?" he murmured, his lips just millimeters from James's own.

It took James a moment to register what  _it_  was, but no matter what Paul wanted, James was pretty sure he would have shown it to him right about now, just to keep him that tantalizingly close. Paul could have asked to see his dick and his tax returns at the same time and James would have done his damnedest to fulfill his wishes if that's what would make Paul happy.

Lifting up his shirt so that Paul could see the words on his ribs was probably a lot safer for the semi-public space they were in. He still couldn't hold back the shiver as Paul's fingers ghosted delicately over his words. He knew it was all in his head, that he was just sensitive because he was ticklish and Paul's fingertips were rough, that the skin there would feel just the same to Paul as the unmarked patches right next to it, but James couldn't stop himself from feeling like the moment was so much more intimate, so much more personal.

The sappier part of him wanted to say that it felt like Paul was brushing up against his soul.

The noise that James made when Paul suddenly ducked his head to press a warm, firm kiss right in the center of the words was high and embarrassing, but when Paul righted himself his face was flushed and pleased.

"You can see mine too, if you want," Paul said breathlessly, but he was already moving to pull his shirt off over his head and turn around to show James his bare shoulder.

There, on the back of his right shoulder, in James's own horribly scrawled handwriting, were the words,  _"Toaster Man."_

"It's even capitalized," he muttered in surprise.

He understood the appeal now, of touching Paul's mark, because this was  _his_  mark on Paul,  _his_  words, dark and smooth against pale, lightly freckled skin, a sign that somehow across space and time, some higher power had decided that this man was meant to be his.

Well, his and one other person's.

"Have you met...?"

He trailed off, unsure how to describe their other soulmate.

Paul understood him though, because he turned around, never shrugging off James's hands so that they ended up pressed to his chest instead, and gave him a small smile.

"No," he said.

He sighed, one hand absently coming up to rest on the back of James's neck while the other curled over his waist, keeping him close.

"And if you're asking me then I'm guessing you haven't either."

James shamelessly pressed into his hold, too happy luxuriating in his  _soulmate's_  grip to look chagrinned.

"I have no idea," he said. "My words are  _Hey, man_."

Paul winced.

"I can see why you wouldn't know," he muttered. "At least mine are a bit more unique. I'd show you them, but, well."

He smirked then, quick and wry and just a tiny bit of salacious.

"Let's just say they aren't somewhere I should be showing you when our teammates could walk in at any second."

"Of course not," James said, nodding quickly and trying to remind his dick that  _their teammates could walk in at any second_  and that reacting to Paul's smirk and  _dear Lord was that a wink_  would make for a really bad first impression to give the team.

He cleared his throat loudly and said, "Mine, uh, mine are on my foot. Well, more of my ankle, really. So it's not, like. Inappropriate."

James was very proud of himself for resisting the urge to ask Paul where, exactly, their other soulmate's words were on him, and considering the practicalities of those words being on either Paul's ass or his dick.

The mischievous glint in Paul's eyes really wasn't doing a lot to help urge away that train of thought.

"You know," Paul said slowly, his voice far too innocent, "Some people say that there's an...interesting reaction, when your soul marks touch."

"Yeah."

James's voice was getting far too strangled and reedy for a situation where any of his new teammates – or worse, Nisky – could walk in at any moment.

Paul pulled him impossibly closer, until there was barely a breath between them.

"Well, let's just say that given where my mark is, and where your mark is for that same soulmate, I could think of a few ways that we could make a soul mark on your ankle very, very inappropriate."

James did his best not to be too obvious about how he was choking on his own tongue.

"Wait, this isn't like, a foot thing, right? Where you have, like, a thing, with feet? Because like, I'm all cool for letting people live and let live, but that's not really, like,  _my_  thing-"

Before James could make any more uncomfortable first-soulmate-introductions insinuations about foot fetishes, Paul – sweet, wonderful Paul – took mercy on him and shut him up by pressing their lips together, and oh, wow, okay, whatever Paul wanted to do, James was  _fine_  with it, as long as Paul kept kissing him like that forever and ever, amen.

"You have the tongue of an angel," James said when they finally came up for air. "A dirty, dirty angel."

Paul laughed and reeled him back in, and kept demonstrating all of the wonderful things he could do with his tongue until Marc-Andre Fleury came in and started making all sorts of scandalized French noises about Paulie kissing the new guy  _where they eat, ew, Paulie, you don't know where he's been_.

When James and Paul both flipped him off at the same time, never even bothering to separate from their kiss to do it, James knew they were a good fit.

And later, when James saw that Paul had the words,  _So you're the soulmate_ , written high on the back of his right thigh, nearly curling along the underside of his ass, and when Paul gave him a physical demonstration of what he was talking about when it came to the interesting positions that could get into that would allow their soul marks to touch...

Well, that was when he knew it was love.

~~~

Given what their other soulmate's first words would be to Paul, they assumed that Paul must say something to them first.

"You better make sure it's something good," James said. "I mean, you did a good job with me, but seeing as I've probably already met our soulmate and neither of us figured it out, we're pretty much relying on you to get our shit together for us."

Paul rolled his eyes fondly before giving a sharp nip to the skin under James's nipple, right where Paul's words on his chest began. James yelped and frowned at him accusatorily, but Paul only smirked and soothed the bite with his tongue, and pretty soon after that James forgot what he was talking about and also most of the English language.

The only good thing about James's theory, Paul pointed out later, was that it implied that their soulmate was someone that James had already met and that Paul would also bump into.

"Which means they're probably a hockey player, or someone connected to hockey," Paul said, sounding so adorably smug and pleased with himself for his deductions that James couldn't help pressing a quick kiss to his cheek.

"I mean, we probably could have guessed that. With you and me, it'd have to be someone who liked hockey, and we don't spend a whole lot of time with, like, non-hockey people."

Paul wrapped an arm around James's bare shoulders, tugging him in close. He kissed James on the forehead, warm and firm, and then left his lips there as they breathed together.

"Do you really think you've met them already?" Paul murmured after a comfortable silence.

James squirmed in his grasp, nuzzling his head into Paul's chest and wrapping a hand over Paul's shoulder so that his fingertips spanned across his words there.

"I feel like I had to have met him, the number of times someone's said those words to me."

Paul snorted quietly and squeezed his shoulders.

"You're so sure it's a he?"

Now it was James's turn to roll his eyes, but because Paul couldn't see him do it, he made a point of poking him in the side instead; Paul made an appropriately wounded noise in response, even though it was clearly for show.

"I mean, for one thing, not many girls introduce themselves by saying,  _Hey, man_ ," he said. "And second, if my years of thorough exploration in juniors meant anything, I feel pretty confident in saying that yes, I am sure that any soulmate of mine is going to be a dude."

Paul paused in stroking James's hair to pull back and squint at him in consideration.

"How thorough was that exploration, exactly?"

When James grinned at him, it was all teeth.

"You're just going to have to find out, aren't you?"

Paul apparently took that as a challenge that needed immediate answering, and James thought very little about their other soulmate for the rest of the night.

~~~

The trade fucking sucked.

Not that Nashville sucked. Nashville wasn't a conventional hockey town but the city was awesome and the fans were just as passionate as anywhere else. The team was pretty great too, was an increasingly strong playoff contender full of great, hardworking players.

The only issue was that James was going to Nashville, and Paul was staying in Pittsburgh, and that really fucking sucked.

He had thought – well. Some part of James had thought that finding his soulmate in Pittsburgh would mean that they might get to stay together, because a GM was feeling merciful if not because, you know, fate wanted them to be together and all.

But James was traded to the Predators, and Paul wasn't, and so James had to set off for Nashville alone.

At least he wasn't alone when he got to the city. As soon as news of the trade broke, he received a Facebook message from someone he hadn't spoken to in six years, welcoming him to the team and offering him a place to stay in Nashville. James hadn't really had to think about it before he accepted the offer.

Rich Clune was a Nashville Predator now, and he looked really fucking good.

Not that he hadn't looked good before, but there was just something about him. He was clearly healthier now, his eyes bright and alert now that he was totally clean. He looked like he had more energy, more spring in his step, and there was just this fucking  _glow_  about him, so effervescent that sometimes when James looked at him he had a really hard time looking away.

Rich was so  _happy_  now, full of smiles and vigor and enthusiasm, and sometimes when he aimed that happiness at James it kind of took his breath away, both settling him and making something in his chest sit up and take notice.

Rich was – he was honestly just pretty goddamn amazing, and there was no way for James to express that without feeling intense guilt as thoughts of Paul came to mind. Paul, who he had only just left behind in Pittsburgh, who was missing James right now just as much as James supposedly missed him, and yet here James was, having his breath taken away by his old buddy from the minors.

"I'm really happy to have you here, man," Rich said, flashing him another toothy smile as he chopped up lettuce for their taco night. "I mean it. I've missed you."

It was all James could do to breathe around the lump in his throat.

What made it worse was that things with Rich were so  _easy_  too. It wasn't like this, back when they played together in Iowa. They had been friends, but they had their own things going on, James trying to get noticed by Dallas and Rich trying to hold his life together even as it disintegrated around him.

But now, James couldn't help but wonder what they would have been like, if Rich had been sober back then, if James had let himself focus on someone else instead of staying in his own lane and only worrying about himself. Would things have been different? Would they have been more like this?

Because this, this was pretty fucking good.

From James's first day in Nashville they did pretty much everything together. They trained together, they cooked together (or rather, James stumbled through basic tasks while Rich supervised and did all of the heavy lifting), they watched trashy tv together. Sometimes they just hung out on the couch together, Rich reading and James screwing around on his phone, close enough that their shoulders pressed and they leaned into each other even though they had ample room to spread out.

Rich introduced James to their different teammates as they trickled back into Nashville to get ready for training camp, and he took him to see the sights around town, showing him the best restaurants and his favorite bookstore because he was actually a huge nerd.

 _He'd get along well with Paulie_ , James thought, and for once, his feelings of guilt whenever he remembered Paul, alone in Pittsburgh while James enjoyed himself with his new-old friend, were tempered by a deep longing to see if his theory was correct.

That longing mixed with that strange, warm feeling that James got in his chest when Rich smiled at him too much, and made James want to do something stupid like tell Rich what he was thinking.

"You know, I bet you'd really get along well with Paulie," he said one night when they were lounging on the couch, James's bare toes tucked under Rich's warm, distractingly firm thigh.

Rich had gone a little too still, only for a moment but long enough for James to wonder if he'd said something wrong. Then he took a deep breath and smirked at James, but there was something a little off about it, a little too hard, a little too much like the blank-eyed smiles that a broken Rich used to give him in Iowa.

"You want to introduce me to the soulmate already." Rich shook his head, still smiling that strange, unhappy smile. "I think I should feel honored."

"One of them," James said before he could actually think about what the fuck he was doing. He had no clue what he was doing, really, why he even said that, but suddenly he felt the need very strongly to make sure that Rich knew that he had two soulmates, that Paul wasn't the only important person in his life.

"One of what?"

James sat up, tucked his chin on his knees, and nodded towards his feet, flexing the toes of his left foot to bring Rich's attention to the two words written on the inside of his ankle.

"Paul is one of my soulmates. Those belong to the other one. We're not sure who he is yet."

Rich frowned at the words, reaching out a hand almost as if he were about to rub his thumb over the words before he thought better of it, drawing his hand back towards his own chest.

" _Hey, man_ ," he murmured quietly. "Well, fuck."

James grimaced. "Yeah, I know. I told Paulie, I bet I've already met him and we just didn't realize."

"I've got a set like that." Rich pressed an absent hand to his hip, where James remembered him wearing a bandage all of those years ago. " _Hey, what's up?_ "

He snorted and shook his head.

"I used to think it was hopeless, with words that generic. I figured, fuck it, why try to clean up my act for someone who the universe clearly doesn't want me to find?"

James never was sure what compelled him to reach out and squeeze Rich's wrist. When Rich stared at his hand in surprise, James almost pulled away, but then Rich pressed his other hand over James's, holding it in place.

They both stared at their joined hands.

"And what do you think now?" James asked, his voice far too strained, far too desperate for the answer.

"Now?"

Rich rubbed his thumb over the back of James's hand, following the movements with his eyes.

Then he looked up, catching James's gaze, and James felt like he couldn't breathe.

"Now," Rich said, staring into his eyes, "Now I think that fate works in mysterious ways, but that it will always bring me back to the person I'm supposed to be with, even if I missed them the first time."

He was so warm, his hands rough from years of hockey and fights but unbelievably gentle. James's toes were still trapped under Rich's thighs and he could feel the firm muscles in his legs flex as he started to shift closer to James, never breaking eye contact, never stopping the firm, heady motion of his thumb over James's hand, and-

They jumped apart as James's phone buzzed loudly on the coffee table in front of them and then began to ring, the display flashing Paul's smiling caller ID photo, and James felt like ten kinds of an asshole.

"I, um, I should get that," James muttered. He untangled himself from Rich so quickly that he nearly fell off the couch and snatched up his phone.

"Hey Paulie, what's up?"

His eyes met Rich's as he spoke, and he felt that guilt again, guilt at what he'd almost done with Rich, but also guilt at abandoning Rich on the couch as he made for the privacy of his room, leaving Rich alone like that moment between them hadn't mattered, like  _he_  didn't matter.

"Hi Jamie."

He could hear the smile in Paul's voice, imagine how it lit up his eyes, and that made him feel even more like shit even as it warmed him.

"So I was thinking," Paul said, oblivious to James's turmoil, to his near-transgression. "We still have a few days before camp starts; what if I come down there to visit you?"

James choked on his own throat.

" _Here?_  Like, Nashville?"

Paul's laughter was loud and clear, and James was the scum of the earth.

"Where else? I was thinking, there's nothing going on for me in Pittsburgh the next few days that I can't do in Nashville, and this way we could spend a bit more time together before the season gets too crazy and we never get to see each other anymore. And besides, maybe I could help you look for your own place so that you don't wear out your welcome with Clune."

He knew that Paul was joking, but something in the back of James's head whispered that if Rich kicked him out, it wasn't going to be because James outstayed his welcome.

No, James had probably already given him dozens of reasons to do that.

It felt dangerous, having Paul and Rich meet after what had just happened, but it was also what he himself had just been suggesting minutes ago as a great idea. And it did seem like a good idea, still, because James thought that Paul and Rich would get along great if they just met and gave each other a chance.

But Paul was also way too perceptive not to notice whatever weird frisson there was between James and Rich, and then he might guess at what had almost happened, and then he would be entirely within his rights to dump James's ass, soulmates or not, and-

"That's an awesome idea, Paulie, I can't wait!"

And James was his own worst enemy.

~~~

Rich wasn't very enthusiastic about Paul coming to visit. He insisted it wasn't anything to do with having Paul stay at his house – when James suggested that he and Paul could just stay in a hotel for the duration of Paul's visit, Rich had gotten this sad, pinched look around his eyes and brushed him off, saying that the idea was ridiculous.

"He's your soulmate," he said, "Of course he can come stay with us."

He was a little surlier when James told him about Paul's plans to go house shopping.

"Why do you need a house? I already have a house."

James had blushed and averted his eyes, muttering, "I think the idea is that you aren't going to want me staying here forever, and so I should start looking for my own place before you get sick of me."

Rich had frowned then, crossing his arms and looking unbearably sad.

"I would never get sick of you," he'd said quietly, his voice achingly sincere. "And this is your home too, for as long as you want it."

There was a gravity to those words suspended in the space between them, hanging heavy with meaning and emotions that James wouldn't even begin to unpack,  _couldn't_  with the thought of Paul so bright in his mind.

But he'd nodded all the same, and agreed that he would try to get Paul's mind off of real estate shopping.

James was still thrilled to see Paul, of course. He was practically thrumming with excitement as he picked Paul up from the airport, ready to show him what he'd learned of Nashville so far, what it looked like through the eyes of a local instead of a hockey player who visited once a year.

He took Paul out for lunch at a cafe that Rich had shown him, telling himself that he wasn't trying to delay the inevitable by keeping Paul away from Rich for as long as possible.

He wasn't going to do anything with Rich, he  _wasn't_. He loved Paul too much to do that to him.

But he couldn't help feeling like Paul would take one look at the two of them together and realize what had almost gone on between them and then everything would be ruined.

And so he took Paul on an impromptu tour of local landmarks, having to use his phone to locate most of them because he was still trying to learn his way around the city. Paul, thankfully, thought that this was charming, but Paul was generally far too charmed by all of James's behavior so that was kind of a given.

Rich texted him shortly before dinnertime, when James was bullshitting up a background story for some statue of a man on a horse for Paul's amusement (because damned if he knew who it was or why it was there).

_you two coming for dinner?_

It was a totally benign question, but James felt like it was obvious all the same how he'd been trying to avoid having Paul meet Rich, and then he just felt like an ass again.

 _on our way_ , he responded.

"Hey, so, Rich is going to start dinner now, so we should probably head over."

Paul frowned suddenly, but less like he was angry and more like he was mortified.

"He shouldn't have to make dinner for us! Oh, God, we could at least be helping. Come on, let's go, maybe we could at least get back in time to do a side dish."

Sometimes James was struck by just how much he didn't deserve Paulie. This was one of those times.

He was also struck by how Paulie was painfully, adorably Midwestern in his sensibilities.

"I mean, you  _are_  a guest..."

"And I practically invited myself, I can't expect him to do everything for me!"

James suspected that at least a part of it was just because Paulie was very particular about cooking and liked to do everything for himself, but James also valued the privilege of eating the food that Paulie made, and so he kept his mouth shut.

Paul must have really been upset about not helping with dinner, if he didn't notice how anxious James was on the drive over. He spent most of it trying to make himself stop tapping nervously on the steering wheel, but still did a poor job of keeping his left knee from bouncing even as he drove.

Everything, in all likelihood, would be absolutely fine. Paul and Rich would meet and they would hit it off just like James had hoped and they would all have a lovely visit and nobody would ever know that James had almost kissed Rich and blown up his entire relationship.

Unless everything went wrong and Paul figured it out immediately and then James was just fucked.

He tapped his fingers a little faster.

Rich's house smelled like tomato sauce when they entered, what James knew from experience had to be his grandmother's absolutely amazing secret recipe.

Paulie's eyes lit up, and James refrained from telling him that Rich would probably never let him know what was in it.

They found Rich in the kitchen, his back to them as he stirred the pot of sauce.

"We're back," James said lamely, even though Rich had to have heard them come in the door.

When Rich looked up at him his lips quirked into a small smirk before his eyes settled on Paul and his expression became more guarded.

"So you're the soulmate," he said in a casual tone that James knew was anything but.

James wasn't sure if it was that his heart skipped a beat or his lungs forgot how to work, but he found himself frozen in shock, mouth hanging open, unable to do much more than stare helplessly back and forth between Rich and Paul, because Rich had just said the words written on the back of Paul's thigh.

"I think I could say the same for you," Paul murmured, sounding like he was short of breath. He was giving Rich that same look he gave James way back when he found James about to horribly abuse a toaster, the expression that was mixed parts awed and fond and so, so excited. James couldn't even say he was jealous, because he was too busy feeling the exact same way.

Rich stilled, slowly putting down the spoon in his hand and scrutinizing Paul carefully.

"Holy shit," James said on his behalf, because somebody here had to say it.

The look Rich gave him was too fond with Paul right there, but then again, maybe it wasn't too fond, because Rich had just said Paul's soulmate words and was acting a hell of a lot like Paul had just said his own words, which meant that they were soulmates, which meant that-

_"Holy shit!"_

"You already said that, Jimmy," Rich said wryly. His eyes were flicking back and forth between James and Paul like he couldn't decide who he wanted to stare at more.

"No, but like, it bears repeating and shit, because you, you, you're-"

"You're our soulmate," Paulie finished for him, because he was a saint. He grabbed James's hand and laced their fingers together, squeezing reassuringly, and James probably would have melted against him right there if he wasn't itching to reach out with his other hand and hold one of Rich's.

Rich kept looking between them as if he couldn't quite believe it, as if he didn't want to let himself trust it.

"You said my words," he said slowly, his eyes on Paul now. He tugged up the short sleeve of his shirt and peeled back the edge of the bandage there. The skin underneath it was much paler than his usual tan, making the dark lines of Paul's words stand out even more.

 _I think I could say the same for you_.

Then Rich reached for the waistband of his shorts and underwear and tugged them both down in one go, enough so that James thought Paul was going to have to make some sort of comment about inappropriate activities and cooking spaces, until he realized that Rich was peeling off the bandage there too.

The words on his hip were just as Rich had told him, a bland,  _Hey, what's up?_  just under the jut of his hipbone. The part that he hadn't told James was that the words appeared to be written in James's own horrible handwriting.

"Holy shit," James said again, this time in a whisper to himself. He took one step forward, two, and then he was reaching out to brush his fingers over the words. He could see Rich shiver at his touch, his muscles trembling finely, but Rich never moved to push his hand away.

James looked up, meeting Rich's eyes and trying not to get lost in what he found there.

"This is mine," he said, letting his hand press fully over the words on Rich's bare hip. "I mean, the words, the words are mine. Or, it's my handwriting, and I'm so sorry I don't remember if they were the first words that I said to you, but they must have been, because it's my writing and like fifteen guys at our first Dallas prospect camp said my words to me so I just got used to not reacting when I heard them, but I-"

His mouth snapped shut as a line of warmth blanketed itself across his back, Paul's arms coming up to bracket James against Rich. He reached around them to turn off the stove, because he was way too responsible even when James felt like all of his emotions were leaking out of him, and then he brought his hand up to rest atop James's on Rich's hip.

"If there was ever any question," Paulie said quietly, hooking his chin over James's shoulder. "These are mine."

He trailed his free hand over the words on Rich's bicep.

Rich followed the movement with his eyes, uncharacteristically quiet.

"Do I get to see yours?" he finally said.

Paul squeezed his arm gently, and James didn't have to see his face to know he was smiling.

"Later, maybe. I have a thing about taking your pants off in places where food is prepared."

"I don't," James said. "Just in case you were wondering. I totally don't."

"Yes you do." Paul nipped lightly at his earlobe, making James twitch in surprise. "I say that you do."

James hummed, tilting his neck and hoping that he could convince Paul to have all of this moved to a bedroom sooner rather than later, but he still mouthed the words,  _I don't_ , for Rich's benefit.

Rich's pupils were blown dark and wide, and his mouth was open just enough to reveal a quick flash of pink tongue, and it was much more enticing than it had any right to be.

Well, if Paulie was apparently going with the flow, then so could James.

With the hand that wasn't still braced on Rich's hip he reached up to touch his cheek, angling Rich's face towards his own.

"Can I kiss you?" he asked quietly, urgently, his breath hitching as Paulie really started to go to town.

"Because I really wanted to a few days ago, when I didn't even know you were my soulmate-" He yelped when Paulie bit down on his neck; he'd probably be hearing more about that later.

"I just really liked you, I liked spending time with you and being around you, and I felt so guilty because I love Paulie so much and I'd never imagined wanting to cheat on him, but you were just so, so  _you_  and you're amazing and funny and you've always taken care of me, even when we were with the Stars, and all this time we were soulmates and we never knew, but I think part of me knew anyway, because I've really wanted to kiss you for a while and I really, really want to kiss you right now."

Rich was staring at him, his face still cupped in James's hand. At first he just looked stunned and a little turned on, but as James kept rambling his eyes warmed and his smile grew until he was giving James that same little smirk that always left him feeling like he'd just been punched in the gut.

"Christ, Jimmy, I've wanted to kiss you for six years," he said, and James didn't get to respond to that because Rich followed it up by grabbing James by the collar of his shirt and pulling him down for a kiss.

Rich dominated the kiss, angling James until he was exactly where Rich wanted him, pinned between Rich and Paul and gleefully helpless to do anything but stand there and take it. Rich's mouth was warm, and he tasted a little bit like the sauce he must have been testing, and the way he nipped at James's lips combined with the way that Paul was very dedicatedly giving him a beard-burn-covered hickey left James feeling like every one of his nerve endings was on fire, tender and scrubbed raw and aching for more.

When Rich finally pulled away, he was panting against James's mouth and looking far too pleased with himself. He reached over James's shoulder and cupped Paul's face in his hand, drawing their gazes together.

"I think I promised to make you dinner," he said in a conspiratorial voice.

Paul huffed, the puff of air against his wet skin sending a shiver down James's back.

"I could make a salad," Paul said.

James jerked in Paul's grasp, trying to turn to catch his eye just so Paul could see in his face what a horrible idea that was.

"Are you guys seriously talking about food right now?"

"Regular meals are important." Rich ran a hand down James's chest, landing somewhere distractingly close to the fly of his shorts.

"And he worked so hard on that sauce," Paul added, dropping his hand from Rich's arm so that he could rest it on James's waist, his thumb stroking over the top of James's ass.

"We wouldn't want it to go to waste," Rich concluded, even as he was working open the front of James's shorts and slipping a hand inside.

He winked at James then, wearing that same self-satisfied smirk, while Paul was too distracted watching the progress of Rich's hands to realize that very untoward things were about to happen in a kitchen.

Somehow, James's two soulmates that he had known for years had only just met, the three of them connecting despite all odds, and they were already conspiring to debauch him together.

But then, who was James to challenge fate?

Rich's hand closed around him, and Paul began a slow, dirty grind against his ass, and dinner was very, very late that night.

**Author's Note:**

> It seems like kitchens are the only places to get any action in this fic. And for some reason in all of my writing James Neal is irrevocably tied with toasters.
> 
> I'm [swedishgoalimafia](https://swedishgoaliemafia.tumblr.com/) on Tumblr.


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